Chapter 59 - Fifty Nine - Holding Hope in our Hands (1/2)
Following Winter will always be Spring, even if that season seems quite reluctant to arrive.
After the second bout of heavy snowstorms came a particularly bitter period with temperatures plummeting to a low never experienced in the formerly temperate country. Though it had been cold before and the snow not willing to melt upon the frozen ground, the steely grey skies had helped keep the thermometer at a relative constant a handful of degrees below zero. And then those clouds parted, but the sun was not kind and the night less so.
Spare duvets, blankets, sleeping bags and unused towels were thrown upon beds in order to keep their occupants as warm as possible, but there was the odd night when the chattering of teeth was all that could be heard within the silence of the sunless period. From then on, the fire in the living room was kept burning, while the occupants huddled around it when not in the gym, burning calories to keep warm, helping to cook in the kitchen or watering the plants, a few of which died, unable to bear the cold.
The former I.T technician, Eraj, fell sick during this period and for a while, it seemed as if he might not pull through. He had no roots, none of Ren Zexian's precious pills were suitable to help him pull through, they could only watch helplessly as they tried to keep him warm, keep him fed and hydrated. His fever abated after the third night and finally, they could breath a sigh of relief, but they still hovered close as he slowly recovered.
Ren Zexian's inner fire kept his body from noticing the bitterness, thus he was not so uncomfortable in this period of time. And each night, his beloved would take advantage of this, draping his cold limbs over Ren Zexian's body and enjoying the warmth he found. Nathan had become closer to Ren Zexian since his confession, usually unwilling to part from his side at anytime, but apart from this, their relationship was not much different that from before. Holding the sleeping youth close to him within their bed was both a joy and a trial as he enjoyed the freedom of embrace, but with that last barrier still between them. The connecting of their bodies in that most primitive and yet spiritual of ways. At least, there was no mention of Nathan moving out of his room and back to the cottage in the Spring, thus Ren Zexian held hope.
And of course, when he had first kissed those tender lips, there had been no rejection, just innocent curiosity. Their kisses had increased in frequency, although had remained somewhat in the realm of chasteness. Still, He could wait. Ren Zexian had lived for ten millennia, he knew patience.
The bitter cold period lasted close to two weeks, wearing away at their bodies as they exhausted themselves in attempts to keep warm and to sleep through the icy nights. After that, the temperatures slowly rose to above freezing, remaining chilly, but no longer so unbearable. Nathan's care allowed for the recovery of some of the plants within the property and greenhouse and the snow and treacherous ice covering the ground finally began to melt.
It was now March, a time when the ground needed to be broken into and prepared for planting, in which Nathan needed to begin sprouting numerous seeds to be planted after the last of the frosts and in which they looked in despair at the sparseness of their rapidly dwindling food supplies. All of the dried pasta and other grains had been eaten, there was no dried fruit or pulses either. The tins and jarred produce was finished. The root vegetables were no more, with the exception of powdered sweet potato and a couple of jars of pickles. Pickles were all that remained of last year's harvest and two jars of jam. Otherwise, what they mostly had on hand was flour, thanks to that last raid in the early Fall of the previous year. It was lucky that Autumn could make noodles and bread with the flour and Nathan could still harvest some leafy greens and new potatoes from the greenhouse, otherwise, their bellies would be well and truly suffering. However, meals, for a while would be either repetitive or bland until new harvests could be made.
Fortunately, the mushrooms from the five kits were beginning to flourish, having not done much in the coldest months and these would soon supplement their meals.
Almost everyone leant a hand, breaking ground, removing weeds and fertilising the new
patches for the vegetables. The space to grow vegetables almost tripled in size for it had become obvious that they would not easily last another winter on what Nathan's garden produced the previous year. Not that that was the youth's fault, just that the numbers the garden needed to support had grown and there would be little or no food to supplement it from tins or imports next time around.
The greenhouse shelves were covered in seedlings, some that would be planted outside in the following month, some that would be retained in the greenhouse. With the help of Nan Li Liang, there was also a miniature paddy field formed to the rear of the greenhouse, but it would still be a while until this received its inhabitants.
As for the wheat grain, they decided to split the seeds into two halves, planting some in a newly formed small field in the back of Nathan's garden and the rest in the front garden of one of the other mansions; the furbished one. Here, also, a small field for corn was cleared and another for potatoes. Although the last one could not be put to use for now, they planned to cycle the quickly growing crop into this space during the summer, when they had seed spare.
For this whole early period, every man, woman and child were kept busy with the digging, planting and wall repairs and other things.